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UK Gov't Considers Expanding Open Source Use
IonPanel writes "BBC have a story about the use of open source software at the heart of British government policy. The UK government is now running trials at both government and local level, citing the world-wide effort of a community of programmers fixing bugs and free upgrades as the reason. And all this despite the good friendship between Bill Gates and Tony Blair. There will be quite a few worried faces at Microsoft over the next few months ... Lets hope it's another Munich!" The experiments -- a joint effort with IBM, run by the Office of the E-envoy -- will "cover a range of departments, from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister to the e-envoy's office itself."
The real reason is probably simple: Money
Not money as in saving by using open source, but saving money as in getting Microsoft and other vendors to drop their pants, because open source is considered, and acknowledged as a competitor.
Regards,
--
*Art
[grin] I just can't see ole "two jabs" using Linux. I can't see him using anything more complicated than a notebook and pencil, to be honest ... Concepts like 'desktop metaphor' were not meant for the JP's of the world (pun intended :-)
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
Tony Blair may be pro-Microsoft but each department has its own budget and makes its own IT decisions. I've seen invitations to tender that specifically require programs to be COM based which makes it a MS easy win. Others require that the supplier have reference sites in the Government already (easy for EDS and Accenture) while others look for a fit with existing Linux/Apache skills. Tony Blair loves Microsoft but open source is alive and well in the UK public services.
1000s Warcraft Gold while you sleep
While "we" are all making fun of mr. Stallman, his original idea (to create a user base for Free Software as to ultimately create a legal platform and status for it) is finally seeing the first tiny steps towards a result; recognition by governments is a good first. This should also (partially) explain his hammering on the GNU brand, as to promote the ideas behind the project on moments as these. You never know what they'll pick up in new legislation just because they've heard of it and find some kind of sense in it.
Now of course this post seems like an open invitation to start another pro-/ anti-RMS GNU vs. BSD bash riot on Slashdot, but I honestly believe that most of that has been said before (duh!). All I wanted to do is put this single point of credit towards mr. Stallman, independent of any other credits he should or should not deserve in your eyes. (Let's see if this keeps you from throwing some old mud on Slashdot...)
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
This could be a major boon for tech manual writers - you know governments - like everything documented (well - supposed to anyway).
Tons of OSS stuff is severely lacking in the documentation department - if enough governments take it up then it could create a nice tech manual industry.
And all this despite the good friendship between Bill Gates and Tony Blair
They fell out long ago. Tony expected Bill to provide UK schools with free software back in '97, but it didn't happen. Then he went along to M$ HQ in the UK during the last election, thinking it would be a good photo opportunity, and instead M$ used him to launch the latest Windows XP.
I think Bliar finally got used to the way businesses like M$ work...
- Lower class people like secretaries and clerks use computers
- Some of the people who have something to do with them, like Mr. Gates, apparently have lots of money and should be kept onside.
I imagine if the thinks about it at all, he now thinks that computers are a matter for the civil service. The person who matters is Gordon Brown at the Treasury, a man who famously used to phone journalists up at 10pm because of something interesting he had worked out from a spreadsheet. And his approach could be summarised very briefly as:- Will this work?
- Will this save money?
- Will this affect UK jobs?
The people to convince about FOSS are in the Treasury, and as they tend to be the smartest people in the UK government, there may be some chance of making it work.Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
I can see it coming. "Linux has GNUs", "ready to launch in under 45 minutes", blah, blah.
The government's statement is here.
Contrary to the thumbsucking BBC think-piece pointed to, this is not just about Microsoft (although it concerns them, obviously). The UK government has had its fingers burned badly in the last few years over huge IT projects that have gone wrong - the Home Office passports debacle, thanks to Siemens, was just one of them, but there have been others involving EDS and Accenture, all using proprietry software, all costing buckets of cash and all having severe problems with overruns. This has as much to do with trying to avoid those messes than the BBC's "Beast of Redmond" bogey monster.
Some more good news is that the government statement included this comment:
At the same time OGC announced its latest deal on pricing arrangements for Software with IBM. This will offer enhanced discounts across the public sector with additional savings where Linux products are specified.
This was brought up when South Korea announced its Open Source initiative due to MS having too much market control.
I can believe that countries would let MS know they are looking at alternatives inorder to get a better deal, but citing "avoiding MS market dominance" or stating that the Open Source model results in more secure and stable code is NOT going to win them points with MS.
No, if I was starting a project just to get MS to lower their prices, I would state that PRICE and only PRICE was what was driving me to look at alternatives. I wouldn't mention reasons that might piss MS off and hurt negotiations. Plus, I would look pretty bad in the public eye if I had claimed other significant reasons for using alternatives and then just caved in because MS lowered their price (what if we were hit by a worm after dumping the project for MS AFTER stating that Open Source is more secure?).
Here's a revolutionary idea . . . maybe UK and SK are really looking into OSS for the reasons they gave because, though the system isn't great, it is not messed up enough to be totally blind to the advantages of OSS?
Sdelat' Ameriku velikoy Snova!
So far I am not impressed.
I'm not unimpressed witht the software; the difficulty is in getting a handle on what the software can and can't do and confidence that what it can't do will be fixed.
When you're buying commercial software you get some or all of
- a visit from a salesman
- product brochures
- a demonstration from an expert in the product
- documentation
- comprehensive on line help
- a road map or new features release plan
- clarity as to what you do and don't get in the support contract
and so on.With this open source offering we appear to be getting few or none of the above: "here's the URL for the demo system, go and play with it". Um yes. Thanks. Not, I fear, a basis on which a public authority can spend lots of tax payers' money on a service for tax payers.
Whilst it seems entirely possible that the open source offering is well designed to meet our needs it also seems entirely possible that it will be unable to demonstrate this to an acceptable risk profile so we'll have to buy something else. The competitors, as usual, include paying for a managed service elsewhere or buying commercial software.
Is this the best face they could find to put in an article dealing with Open Source adoptation?
I agree. This one is much cuter.
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
I think the point they were trying to make is since the public (as taxpayers) paid for the software, that the public should have access to the source code.
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
This is not simply an issue of Money, as many have suggested here, as govermental office in the UK get substantial discounts on MS products (although obviously not as cheap as gettng them free). One of the real reasons for looking to open source products is the issue of control. If the tools of goverment are so complex and opaque that the goverment rely on an outside, foreign source, who really runs the country? In theory at least with an open source solution the Goverment could cut ties with the original developers and get another group to develop. ALso the goverment could employ its own developers to ensure the software is not full of "spyware" - in the original meaning of the word in this case!
Here in the UK the goverment is seriously looking into the introduction of ID cards. The infrastructure for this would be run on computers. I for one would be very concerned if a very large, very powerful, foreign (albeit allied) company was given the tender to install such a system. He who controls the information, controls the world....
-- "Can't sleep, clowns will eat me!"
This babe obviously reads /. too much and has mistaken BSD for toast.
Government (central and local) in the UK is very focused on process rather than delivery - partly because of scandals, partly because we have very tight auditing mechanisms. It's the reason that IT projects by government often come to nothing, incidentally. But the point of the project is that local authorities and central government departments will adopt nothing unless they're certain it's been tested and validated by someone who has some kind of authority. That authority used to be the US government, but things are changing and now the UK government has its own agenda - a Good Thing.
"This is why men never share their feelings; because women always remember." -Just Shoot Me.
When you're buying commercial software you get some or all of....
;-)
Go to the URL, find the name and email of the primary author of the software and send him an email. In your email, explain the situation and invite him for a consultation. Offer to pay airfare and expenses and, perhaps, a small consulting fee for the day. Your total expense for this will be insignificant compared to the procurement costs for commercial software.
What you will find is that the person who shows up is an absolute expert in the software (he wrote it), will be happy to work for you as a consultant making your improvements and bugfixes (guaranteed to be competent, since he wrote it) and will probably leave you on that day with a fully operational and configured system at your location, for the cost of his visit.
If you would prefer power-point presentations from a salesman who probably has never really used the software that he is selling outside of presentation environments to be followed by incredibly high licensing costs, delays and lock-in consultants at outrageous prices that cannot even modify the software that you bought, take the proprietary course that you mentioned.
But I sincerely hope, for your sake, that you will give my suggestion a "go around".
The reason that it can be true that 1+1 > 2 is that very peculiar nonzero value of the + operator
It's a shame that as one part of the government expands its OSS use, another part Implements the DMCA
so if I where an admin there, I'd do the trasition in several steps, slowly under a longer period of time (like 1-2 years...but it all depends on what level the users are on..):
then, when they start asking "why are we still running & paying for M$ windows?, when everything we do is available on the free/open enviorment linux (linux/gnu) platform, for a fraction of the cost."... then I would say, it's a supreme situation to dring forth that linux install...
think of the +plus side, of it; time will only make the linux kernel and distros better, and give you plenty of oppertunity to plan & execute the whole trasition very/more effectlly.
PS. Don't forget, that M$ had lots of time getting their users used to using apps only for their platform, that after a while users can't/couldn't see past running anything else than windows, as the software they know & love is only win32.... so it makes sense to first "un-program" them from that restriction...
I don't claim I know more than I know, and if you know you know more than I know, then by all means, let me know.
The software - open or closed - does not maintain itself. The mere existence of the source code is as good as nothing if there is no-one who understands it.
If no one is using it, it probably isn't very good and you should find another option. One would think that this would be obvious, both for commercial software and for Open Source software.
It's dangerous to start thinking that as long as the source code exists, anyone (with a CS degree) can just take it up, fix it and start maintaining it. In less than a decade the languages and architectures change so much that a newly graduated person will have difficulties in dealing with ancient code.
No, I don't think so. I think it is much more dangerous to allow your government to lock itself into a relationship with a vendor that will never release the source code. The government will never have control over those systems and the people being governed will never have the right to inspect and audit how those systems work.
Any competent engineer coming out of University today could very easily deal with twenty year old code. In fact, they could probably write scripts (or find conversion utilities) that would allow them to bring it up-to-current, converting source code and whatnot. But in a case like this, one would think that any system that the government is considering would have enough of an interest level (certainly after it is put into practice) such that it will be supported continuously. But if it is not, at least we are safe in the knowledge that the code is not lost and CAN be updated at any time without lawsuits and Indiana-Jones style find-the-source-code adventures.
Just remember all those Y2K projects? Sure we had the source code for critical projects but the code was in Cobol or some other antiquated language. We suddenly found out that we need loads and load of people who know Cobol, but the people who had the skills to deal with it were already gone. A lifespan measured in decades is particularly typical for governmental projects. You see how silly your argument is? The availability of the source code is good but doesn't save you.
This is funny, because you are actually making MY argument for Me. Y2K is a great example. There was certainly an IT spending boost, but so far as I am aware, all of the real problems encountered were encountered with systems that came from out-of-business vendors and/or vendors that couldn't locate source for decommissioned products. The other major problem was in-house projects that had been in the attic for twenty years and often just trying to figure out how to do a build or install the build. Had these projects been open-source, there would have been a virtual guarantee that a small community would have formed around those projects to update them (you being one of the members), saving money, time and in many cases, just making it possible.
Getting and using the Cobol programmers? That was just a matter of money (consultants), and quite a temporary problem. I know of many instances of 'C' or ''VB' programmers grabbing COBOL books and jumping in the fray.
If did you homework when writing the contract you have nothing to fear. The company will be obliged to help you over the transition period.
When a company goes out of business, your belief that they will honor their contracts with you may help you sleep at night, but those beliefs are not going to pay the costs or motivate the people at the company that is going out of business to do such a thing. Your comment is silly. You know what happens when a company goes out of business? THEY STOP HONORING ALL CONTRACTS BECAUSE THE COMPANY IS DEAD.
As far as the end-of-life products go, that's just natural. I've never quite understood the obsession the open source has with maintaining obsolete code. From time to time it's good to end an old product line and write another one from scratch to meet the challenges of today not the past.
It is your personal duty to fight for what is right on a daily basis. Ignoring injustice is identical to approving
OpenOffice can substitute Word+Excel+Powerpoint. But there is no groupware application in OpenOffice.
Mozilla Browser typically substitutes IE. Mozilla Mail can get all email and some contact management functions from Outlook. But Mozilla Calendar is far from being capable to substitute Outlooks's Tasks and Meetings, first of all as Mozilla Calendar is a personal not-networked application. Besides, no any equivalent of Public Folders in Mozilla.
I understand that it is not Mozilla's or OpenOffice's fault - it's all about lazy calendar server programmers. Just kidding. Seriously - there is no any well working open-source calendar server around yet. I guess without calendaring server there will be a lack of calendar clients - exactly what we observe now.
Of course the lack of calendaring clients from open-source has been already compensated by available web-based calendaring applications. But, I am sorry, that doesn't work, unless it's integrated with webmail, and as for today, there is no any opensource suit combined BOTH well-implemented: mail and calendar.
All said above is about open-source on win32. But Linux can add a little to it: Evolution doesn't work with any open source calendaring server - again, as there is no such.
Less is more !
When politicians tell me they could simultaneously cut taxes and increase spending on health or transport or whatever - by reducing wasteful and sloppy practices - I believe them. It's when they tell me they will do that I begin to doubt their honesty.